~ I was a pro writer. Now it's just fun.

Monthly Archives: October 2014

The broad downtown street where several hospitals are located was quieter after nightfall. Doctor Diane Goldstone sat at her desk and looked down on the sparse traffic. It is usually teeming with cars up and down on either side of the wide boulevard. Grass, flowers and benches on the traffic island make it like a long, thin park between the traffic lanes.

She forced her attention back onto the paperwork on her desk. She was not usually at her office at this hour, but the week had been overwhelming with a flu going around in the hospital, both staff and patients. There were several traffic accidents and a few shootings, so the Emergency Room was non-stop, which was not unusual. Still, paperwork had to be done, so working late is the only answer. Besides, if she lets it go, it just piles up and becomes almost impossible, and that’s bad, real bad.

Nurse Ruth stood quietly in the open doorway to Diane’s office, her face white, her posture tense. She cleared her throat before she spoke.

“Uh… Doctor Goldstone…” she said quietly while she tapped on the door frame with her knuckles. Diane looked up quickly.

“Come with me to Emergency, doctor,” Ruth said. “I’m not sure, but I think it’s someone you should see.”

“Is it serious?” Diane said as she hurried along the corridor with the nurse.

“It’s serious and more,” Ruth said as they entered the ER. She guided Diane to a gurney on the far side of the busy room. Diane looked down at the battered face of the woman on the gurney and gasped.

“My god! My sister Renee!” Diane said. She had not seen her in almost six years. Diane had given up looking for her. Renee had it out with their father and left town.

“I thought it was when I saw her ID, and I could see the resemblance through the damage. Poor girl.” Ruth said.

Diane called in her colleague, Doctor Sherman, to take care of Renee. The hospital frowns on doctors administering to their own relatives. After an initial examination, Dr. Sherman informed Diane that her sister had been severely beaten and kicked. She had two broken ribs, a pierced lung, several fractures and lacerations.

Doctor Diane Goldstone sat at her desk and shook with shock and anger. She blamed herself for being unable to stop Renee’s drug downfall. She felt she’d been inadequate to find Renee after she fled. In any case, she had Renee now, and would see to her social and physical rehabilitation. For the moment, Diane was shaken and fatigued, and decided to go home and leave Renee in Dr. Sherman’s able hands.

Leaving the Hospital, Diane was accosted by a tall, beautiful black girl. Diane noticed her impractical clothing but didn’t assume she was a prostitute.

“Doctor Goldstone?” the girl said. Diane stopped and turned to the girl. “That girl brought in tonight,” the girl went on, “that sonuvabitch cop did it.”

“You saw what happened?” Diane said.

“Yes. And I’ve seen him do it before, but not this bad,” she said, shaking her head. “She’s brand new on the hookers’ walk, and Big Mike had to show her who’s boss.”

“Hookers’ walk? Who’s Big Mike?” Diane said.

“Detective Inspector Mikhial Fedorov – We call him Big Mike Fedora ‘cause he always wears a fedora and a trench-coat, like he’s Sam Spade or something,” the girl said.

“Thank you miss… uh…”

“That’s okay, doc,” the girl said. She turned on her heel and went to a Lincoln Town Car at the curb, where her pimp was waiting.

In small, remote towns in Russia, justice was often meted out by the police on the street. When Mikhail Fedorov was a small boy, he saw police pretty well taking what they wanted. If a merchant protested when a policeman helped himself to merchandise, he would be rewarded with a beating by a length of rubber hose. If a pedestrian somehow offended an officer, he might be beaten. Young Mikhail Fedorov saw it happening sometimes on the streets of the town. Other times, his father, a police patrolman himself, regaled him with tales of proud brutality. One time, when Mikhail’s mother was out of the house, his father had told him of taking a woman off the street and having sex with her. He was clearly proud and happy about that, and Mikhail thought of his father as quite a he-man hero.
When Mikhail was twelve, his father was shot and killed in the street. The story was that Mikhail Senior was killed by a pimp who was fed up with him beating up his girls. Other stories said that the husband of a woman he had raped had killed him. In any case, nobody felt badly about his violent demise except his devoted son.
Less than a year after his father’s funeral, his mother took him with her to Canada. She was to share life with her sister and her fifteen year old daughter, and Mikhail would attend school as usual and learn the language and characteristics of life in a small town in Canada.
As the years passed, Mikhail Fedorov followed in his father’s footsteps and went into law enforcement at nineteen. While he was growing up, so was the town, and when Mikhail was patrolling, the town was a small, busy city. He became a familiar sight around the streets, although he was not very friendly. He did his job to the very limits of the law, even stepped over the line occasionally. He was a good, hardworking cop, basically.
Mikhail rose through the ranks based on his good arrest record. He finally made Detective Inspector. By that time, he was known as ‘Big Mike Fedora’. He always wore a trench coat and a fedora hat, usually pulled down over his forehead when he was interrogating or perched on the back of his head when he was thinking.
Soon after his promotion to a senior position, Mike’s activities on the streets changed. He had never been very friendly, but he had been fair. People were puzzled when he began to take things. He began to help himself to things like a bottle of Russian Vodka from the liquor store, or a bag of groceries from the little market uptown.
The real trouble began when he started taking girls for himself. He cruised along in his unmarked car and when he saw a girl he wanted, he forced her to get into the car and give him oral sex or face charges of prostitution. The girls felt they had no choice.
Late one night when he was feeling horny, Big Mike saw a new girl on ‘the stroll’. He was stricken by the milky white of her smooth complexion, the long black hair and radiant blue eyes. He powered the passenger window down and called her over to the car.
“Looking for a party, Inspector?” she said. The other girls had told her about Big Mike Fedora, and she knew what to expect.
“Get into the car,” Mike said.
“Why?” the young woman said.
“It’s your turn to give me a blow job,” he said. “You’re new here, and you have to pay your way in.”
“Go fuck yourself,” the girl said, and walked away. Several other girls were watching from up and down and across the street. Big Mike Fedora knew he had to show the whole hooker stroll that they can’t fuck with him. He stepped out of the car and strode quickly up to the woman, spun her around and punched her hard in the face with his big ham sized fist. She fell back against a brick wall and hit the back of her head, hard. She crumpled to the ground and Mike started kicking her in the stomach, legs and arms. Finally, he stomped on her rib cage and stood back, straightened his clothes and looked around at the girls and some passersby.
“Don’t fuck wit’ Big Mike Fedora!” he said before he entered his car and drove home.

You’re walking up the broad sidewalk of a downtown street. It’s early evening in autumn and light is slipping away. The buildings that surround you are large, with hundreds of offices above large stores on the ground floor. Walking toward you is an attractive woman in an airline uniform. Your eyes meet for less than a second, and each of you jerks your glance away, to rest on something harmless. But what happened in that semi-second?
There was a connection. Some instinct told each of you that if the pair of you was together, it would be a mutually pleasurable coupling. These moments are a mystery. What could it possibly be that a fraction of a second would having you thinking of her while she’s thinking of you and both are wondering “What if?”
We never know if we are bypassing the one who would nurture daily happiness for us. We never know if the next person that attracts you is a needy mess, while the one for whom you had no time would have been ideal. But she was on her way to something that mattered, and so were you, so it was just not the right time. It might have been the right person, but not at the right time.
I can recall a time, many years ago, when I met a woman – a married woman – that I found arousing to say the least. There was never a moment when I felt confident enough to try to seduce her, but left obvious clues that I wanted her. Finally, one day she called me, but I was in my car with important visitors from overseas, and was committed to hosting them for a week. She could not know the reason for my reticence because I couldn’t explain things then and there in the car full of people. I have always regretted that the call came at that inconvenient moment. I could have re-connected with her, I suppose, after my guests had moved on, but I felt the moment had past. That ideal moment that would have led to some wonderful hours was missed.
On the other side of the inexplicable instant love syndrome, there is the inexplicable absence of that attraction. When I was in my late teens at a dance hall in a beachside summer resort I saw what is still today the most beautiful girl I had ever seen in my life. To this day, I’ve not seen, personally, a woman as beautiful. I asked her to dance, we danced, she was a few years younger than I was but acceptable. I think she was fifteen and I was eighteen.
Recently, this stunning woman located me on facebook, and is not shy about telling me that she always loved me. Interestingly, in spite of her beauty, her wealthy background and shared cultural influences, that powerful desire thing just wasn’t there. Who knows why? She’s still gorgeous and very rich… but I don’t feel anything deeply about her.

In his blind fury at Black seducing Vivian for fun while he actually cared about her, Jake burst into Vivian’s cabin before he’d even thought of what he’d do next. He just wanted to interrupt whatever was going on between them. What he saw was Black and Vivian sitting on the sofa sharing a joint. They looked up at him in surprise.
“What’s in that joint?” Jake growled.
“What’s it to you, Jake?” Black said. “You’re not really going to defend the maiden’s honour here, are you?”
“As a matter of fact, I am,” Jake said. Black stood up, took another toke on the joint and handed it to Vivian before he lunged at Jake. Jake sidestepped easily and chopped Black in the back of his neck with the edge of his hand. Black was dazed and sat on the floor for a moment rubbing his neck and shaking his head as if to clear it. He looked up at Jake and lunged again, this time a seven inch blade protruded from his hand. Black slashed Jake’s cheek before Jake could dodge the sweeping lunge. When he saw the blood, Black assumed the fight was won and paused. Jake seized the opportunity and kicked Black’s knife hand. The weapon flew behind a chair.
Disarmed, Black looked around for something to use as a weapon until Vivian took a heavy vase and broke it over Black’s head. At the same time, Black’s cohorts burst in. What they saw was a raw gash in Jake’s cheeks, Black laid out on the floor and Vivian just standing there.
“Don’t just stand there, assholes,” Jake said. “Take your boss and get out of here.”
“What happened to him?” the girl asked.
“I beat the shit out of him,” Jake said, taking advantage of the opportunity to enhance his reputation in the gang. “Tell the rest of them that Jake beat the shit out of Black. Black used a knife, Jake used nothing, so Jake rules.”
They half walked, half dragged Black out of Vivian’s cabin. Vivian went to work on Jake’s wound.
“You’re going to have a scar,” she said, “Like a Nazi commandant or a pirate.”
“Or a Biker,” He smiled and winced because it hurt the wound.
“What will happen now?” Vivian said.
“There will be a meeting where the situation is discussed, and that’s where it will be decided what will happen now,” Jake said.
“What will happen with you and me?” Vivian said.
“We’ll do our work, make lots of money, live in the forest and make love a lot.”
“Will we live together?”
“Don’t you think it would be good to have our own places to go to,” Jake said. “We can stay with each other when we feel like it, at either cabin and still have our own space.”
“Okay, let’s try it like that then,” Vivian said. “So we can start at my place, now.” She took Jake to her bed where they made love ‘til they slept. When they awakened, they made love again after which Jake went to his own cabin. Tomorrow they’d be working in the forest, and they could make love there, in the warmth of the sun.

It was inevitable that Black would soon be rumbling down into the valley, so Vivian and Jake made ready for any unannounced visit from the vicious gang leader. Since the night of the big rainstorm, they had been sleeping together either at her cabin or his cabin. Vivian was very happy with the arrangement. She had always loved sex, and all the more when it was love making rather than hasty quickies.

Vivian was enjoying major thrills, not only because Jake was large, strong, lean and good looking. She admitted to herself that there was an additional thrill in the awareness that her lover was more than twenty years younger than she was. He was a more liberated lover than she had experienced. The feeling of clean innocence was in the atmosphere, even though the actual love making was extreme, with foreplay sometimes lasting more than an hour.

There were massages, too. Jake would lay Vivian out on a dining room table with sofa cushions on it. He would place a sheet over her, put on warm, sensual music and light the room with candles. His massage was actually a full-body caress, first the back, from skull to toes for about half an hour, then the front, from face to toes. Whatever variations Jake might make in the over all caress, it always ended the same way. Jake would put one of Vivian’s legs over his shoulder and caress her vagina with his lips and tongue until her deep orgasms were exhausted.

Every six days, Viv would get her gardening kit from Jake and trek off through the forest to plot C. Aside from the heavy weight of the liquid fertilizer that she hauled into the burgeoning hemp plants, she enjoyed the time in the forest. It was quiet, with bird songs and insect sounds over the whisper of the breeze in the treetops. The sun shone through the foliage and created dappled shadows that danced on the ground before her. The return walk was even more enjoyable as the duffle bag was much lighter.

On one occasion, Jake surprised Vivian in the forest after she had completed her gardening work. They lay on the ground that was a bed of dry leaves and amid the innocent forest sounds, scents and colours, they made love for almost two hours. They were resting when the distant rumble of Black’s Harley and his two sidekicks’ reached their ears. Jake dressed hastily and ran through the forest to emerge onto the road from a different direction. Viv dressed and made her way back to Jake’s cabin as she always did.

Black was already at Jake’s cabin with the woman and man with whom he rode and Jake was walking down the road from plot B. Vivian was walking from the far side where plot C is. They arrived in front of Black at the same time.

“And the newest member of our team?” Black said. “How’s it goin’ Viv?”

“It’s like Jake says, it’s nice in the forest, so I make the best of it. I stuck my nose where it didn’t belong, and now I’m stuck between a rock and a soft place.”

“What do you mean by that,” Black said.

“I mean I have this criminal responsibility that I brought on myself – that’s the rock – and I have my cozy cabin in this wonderful valley, that’s the soft place.”

“Let’s go up to that soft place and smoke some good stuff,” Black said. He put his powerful hand around Vivian’s upper arm and walked her that way whether she wanted to go or not.

Vivian could feel that something bad was going to happen. Black was going to take her against her will. Jake could feel it too, and he sat in his cabin smoking and struggling against the desire to stop Black. He began to wonder why he should struggle against it. He realized he really loved Vivian Montgomery, and he was not going to let Black tarnish Vivian. He headed up the dusty road while the two outriders warned him to stay away. He ignored them. They began to follow him from a long way back. Jake was determined to stop Black.

The rain lashed at the windows, the fire crackled happily, Jake held the neatly rolled joint and put a flame to it. It glowed on the tip and he handed it to Vivian.

“No,” she said. “Show me first.” Jake put the joint to his lips, drew in a deep breath and held it for several seconds before exhaling a cloud of fragrant smoke. He handed the joint to Sylvia. She put the joint to her lips and sucked in too hard and exploded in a fit of coughing. She sipped at her coffee to control the cough while Jake took another full toke and put the joint out.

“That’s enough for now,” he said. “You should enjoy the fruit of your labours in the forest, not choke on it.”

“You know, Jake,” Viv said thoughtfully, “it’s an unusual thing to find a sort of gentleman living alone in a remote cabin.”

“You’re a sort of lady living alone in a remote cabin,” he said. “You should understand.”

“I’m fifty. What are you? About twenty-five,” she said.

“Twenty eight,” he said.

“Do you think we’re friends now?”

“In a way, I guess we are,” Jake said. “I was in a tight spot and reached out for help. Now I’m sitting here, warm, dry, comfortable, talking with a neighbour. It seems friendly, doesn’t it?”

“I could use a snack, couldn’t you?” Vivian said.

“I could eat,” Jake said, “but I don’t want you to go to any trouble.”

“No trouble. Get comfortable by the fire and I’ll see what we have here,” she said. Jake moved to an easy chair in front of the fire and stretched out his long legs. Vivian came out of the kitchen.

“Everything okay here?” she said.

“Just fine, thanks,” Jake said. He took out the joint and re-lit it. He took a toke and handed it to Vivian. She drew the smoke in carefully, gulped air and held it in.

“Well done,” Jake said.

Jake happily watched the dancing flames while Viv was busy in the kitchen. She was feeling very peculiar, and was getting unusual impulses when selecting things to prepare as a snack. In the end she found her box of Ritz crackers and a tin of smoked oysters.

“I think I’m stoned,” Viv said.

“I think you’re stoned, too,” Jake laughed.

After they had emptied the plate of smoked oysters on crackers they began to share stories. Vivian about her education and career and financial efforts. Jake spoke about his absentee father, wealthy and powerful in Brazil, and with virtually no contact with Jake or Jake’s mother. He had chosen to stay with his mother and care for her. When she passed, Jake felt he owed it to himself to do what he most wanted to do – so he moved to avoid people and enjoy serenity.

“I guess we sort of have this in common, this desire to be apart from people,” Vivian said.

“And now I have a desire for you, Vivian,” Jake said. Vivian stood looking out into the dark, rain swept valley. She saw her reflection in the window, and the reflection of Jake, coming up behind her. He pressed his body to her back and enveloped her with his arms. His hands cupped her breasts.

Vivian swivelled around in Jake’s arms, threw her arms around his neck and kissed him hard. He held her close, and Vivian felt like melting.

There grew a wall of doubt and caution between Jake and Vivian. The cat was out of the bag when Jake wanted to create a relationship with her. It seemed to Viv a very peculiar situation in which one man was so dominant that simply dating a woman was a warning to all other men to stay away from her.

Every time she went down the road to Jake’s to get her gardening kit, they faced an awkward silence. Jake wished he’d kept it to himself, and so did Vivian. At the same time, an unexpected aura developed that surrounded that quarter of the valley occupied by the pair of them. There seemed to be an electricity, and an intense excitement when in the lake for a relaxing swim. Just being naked with Jake’s cabin within view made her tingle inside. She was angry and ashamed of herself.

One day she saw Jake naked as he waded into the water. His physique seemed to be more interesting than Vivian had anticipated. She wondered what might happen if she ran into the water and swam over to Jake. It was sure to be different from Black’s style. Brutal but careful. She was sure Jake would be slow, gentle, exploring her with sensual caresses.

Vivian shook herself. ‘what am I thinking?’ she thought. Both of them were pretending there was no attraction, no curiosity between them. One day, as she was driving into town for supplies, she stopped at Jake’s cabin. He was standing in the open entrance to his workshop, inspecting some kind of tool.

“I’m going shopping. Can I get anything for you?” she said.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said. “I’ll make a short list of stuff you can pick up for me, and in return I’ll make supper for you tomorrow.”

“That’s a deal,” she said, and shut down the truck engine. In the quiet of the valley, she once again was captivated by the rich, sweet fragrance in the air, the songs of a thousand kind of birds and insects. A hummingbird buzzed past her to some flowers in front of Jake’s cabin. Jake returned with a list of seven items and Viv took off down the road and up over the steep hill that led in and out of the valley. A valley occupied by Jake and Vivian, and nobody else, although the spectre of Black is always there, a cruel barrier.

Vivian spruced herself up a bit before heading out the Jake’s place for supper. She had obtained and delivered his grocery requirements and was set for supper at seven.

Jake welcomed her in and held her chair. The table had a white tablecloth over it, there were little canapes that he must have made himself, and a pretty good French wine. He lit candles and chatted. Vivian loved the roast beef that Jake had cooked to a level of excellence usually found in five star restaurants.

One night there was a power failure during a torrential downpour. Vivian had wanted to protect herself out there in the forest, so she’d had a five thousand watt generator built into her attached garage. She hurried out to the control panel and fired up the smooth Honda generator.

The house was lit up, and everything was as good as when the power came through the wires. Vivian made coffee and lit a fire for coziness. She stood looking out her picture window at the dark shape that was Jake’s cabin. Normally, she took solace in knowing he was there in an emergency, but with no lights on, it was like he was gone.

The storm built to a crescendo, with roaring wind pushing a wall of water against the large windows in Vivian’s cabin. She peered out through the wall of water and barely saw a figure hurrying up the road. A lightning flash revealed that Jake was wearing a rain poncho so the wind at his back was pushing him up the road like a sail.

Vivian hurried over to the door and opened it as Jake arrived. She hurried him in out of the storm and urged him to remove the poncho and sit for coffee. They sat and engaged in small talk while enjoying the coffee and cookies Viv had put out on the table. Jake complemented the delicious cookies and Vivian returned the complement about the supper she’d enjoyed at his place.

They sat in silence, listening to the intensity of the storm. The thrum of the generator could just be heard. Jake looked into Vivian’s eyes, and she returned the glance.

“What’s it going to be, Jake?” Vivian said quietly. Jake took a neatly rolled joint out of his shirt pocket.

“Will you share this with me,” he asked her. She thought about it.

“Why,” she said.

“It will help to decide what’s going to be,” he said.

“How?”

“I won’t tell you how, because that would destroy the impartiality of the end result.”

The Thursday before her ‘date’ with Black, Vivian was still obliged to do her job at plantation C. She was up early, and enjoyed coffee, toast and orange juice on her porch. She could see, down the road, Jake preparing her ‘kit’ of liquid fertilizer made from bat shit. She was careful to avoid touching it because she had read that many bats have rabies, and she sure didn’t need that.

She donned her boots, work jeans and jacket and strode down the road to Jake. He gave her the gunny sack of materials to sling onto her back.

“I have to go with you today,” Jake said.

“Why?” Vivian said as they walked toward the trail to plot C.

“I’m going to show you how to trim the buds,” he said.

While he did a bud trimming to demonstrate the chore, Viv became irritated with his unfriendly attitude. He always seemed to be annoyed that he had to work with her and teach her about life as he lived it by teaching her the things he did for a living.

“You’re always sort of pissed off with me,” she said. “I can understand that I am an intrusion into your life, but it’s not my fault. Black has made me do all this. Still, I’m a bit pleased in some ways. I’ve gotten to know you a bit, and you know some things about me. Don’t you think that’s groundwork for a neighbourly friendship?”

“What if one of us wants to take a step beyond friendship?” Jake said. “That can’t happen as long as Jake wants to be the man in your life.”

“Would he really kill us?” Vivian said incredulously.

“At least hurt us badly, but for sure kill us afterword,” he said.

They didn’t speak again for some time except for Jake coaching and criticizing Vivian’s skill in trimming leaves off of the marijuana buds.

“You’re a nice guy, Jake,” she said. “And big, and really, pretty good looking. You must have many women in your book.”

“Not the kind I hope to meet,” he said. “Biker babes are fun, but I wouldn’t want to own one.”

“What kind of woman do you hope to meet?” Viv said.

“That likes the outdoors, seclusion. She should be self-assured, intelligent, attractive, sexy, open minded.”

“It will be a hell of a job finding one that’s like that out here,” she said.

“I found one,” he said. “But she’s spoken for.”

“That’s a shame,” she said. “Where did you meet her?”

“She’s a neighbour, moved into the cabin up the road from mine.”

“ME!” Vivian laughed. “I guess I do meet some of those criteria, and some I sure don’t. I’m at least twenty years older than you, and I can hardly believe you find me attractive, sexy and open minded.”

“Why? Black does, and I can understand it. I’ve got you under my skin, as the song says.”

Vivian twisted out of Black’s grip and pushed through the shoulder deep water toward shore. She ran onto the beach mindless of her nakedness. It was too late to be demure about that. She grabbed her robe on the way by and ran to her cabin carrying the robe bunched up in front of her. She turned to see if Black was chasing her. He was standing by his clothes, as naked as Vivian, and his protruding penis was clearly visible in profile.

“Make coffee!” Black shouted to her as she went into her cabin and locked the door behind her. She hurried to her room, dried herself, dressed in jeans and a t-shirt and put on a pot of coffee. She realized suddenly that she was doing what she was told by this dangerous criminal. Before she could ask herself why she did that, he was dressed and at the door. She let him in, and while she was pouring coffee and setting out donuts, she asked herself why she’d done that, too.

“Do you really feel disdain for me, Viv?” he said as she entered with a tray of coffee and donuts and set them on the coffee table between Black’s chair and her place on the sofa.

“Yes,” she said and handed him a mug of coffee and gestured at the sugar and cream. It somehow pleased her that he took it black no sugar.

“Why,” he said and sipped his coffee.

“Because you’re a violent criminal,” she said and glared at him.

“Does it help if I tell you I’m a mechanical engineer with a diploma from MIT,” he said, “and I stood third in my class.” Vivian stopped to think about that for a moment.

“Is that true,” she said.

“I’ll take you to my place some day,” he said, “and you’ll see it on the wall.”

“Why are you a violent criminal then?” she said. She extended the plate of donuts to Black, and he perused them carefully until he chose a plain sour cream donut.

“That’s too long and too personal a story to tell someone I hardly know. You have probably already noted that I don’t speak like a Neanderthal. I grew up in a wealthy family and ran away when I was sixteen.”

“Why?” she said and selected a cinnamon donut.

“I couldn’t stand the mendacity,” he said. “Everybody’s fulla shit, lying to themselves, lying to each other, and revelling in a boring sameness, each just like the other. I think life should be exciting, fun, and varied.”

“I can’t honestly argue with that,” Vivian said.

“So lets try to find something new in each other,” he said.

“What does that mean,” she said feeling a bit nervous at that.

“There’s a motorcycle gathering at the Ram’s Head Club in Kleinton on Saturday,” he said. “It’s always a lot of fun, so you’ll come with me and be my bitch.”

“For one thing, Mr. Black,” she said, “I’m nobody’s bitch. And for another thing, I’m about fifteen years older than you. One more thing – I’ve never been on a motorcycle. Frankly, I don’t want to ever be on one.”

“More like twenty years older, Viv. You’ll find out Saturday morning how good it feels to a woman when she’s sitting astride that rumbling, vibrating Harley,” he said.

“I told you I’m not going,” she said. Black stood and went around the table. Vivian stood up in alarm. When Black got her in his arms, he kissed her long and hard before he released her. She staggered back, then swung at Black’s face, and slapped him hard. He recovered his balance and went to the door.

“Thanks for the coffee and donut, Viv,” he said. “See you Saturday morning. Be ready at eight promptly.”

Vivian sat back and held her head in her hands. Of all the things about this situation that are bad, the worst is that Black excites her.

Gradually, Vivian Montgomery came to understand that she had become an ‘agent’ of Black’s Bikers, as she came to know them. Jake rolled a joint and offered it to Vivian. She recoiled as though it was a poisonous snake. Jake languidly put a match to the joint and put it between his lips. Vivian finished her beer and said goodbye. Trudging up the road in her heavy, mud-laden boots, she remembered Jake’s face when he said, ‘now you’re in trouble anyway’. It made her wonder how much trouble she might be in – from Black, or Jake, or any other of these criminal outcasts.

A few days after she had done her first gardening job at plot ‘C’, the mud road had dried and was again dirt. Unexpectedly, Black came rumbling down into the valley on his glossy Harley-Davidson. He rode past Jake’s cabin and parked at Viv’s place. He looked through her home when she saw that she was out. From the front deck, he could see her robe on a tree branch beside the valley lake. Just beyond, he saw her swimming smoothly out from shore.

Black made his way down to to water’s edge. He sat on a log near Vivian’s robe. Vivian was focused on her swimming, stroking along smoothly, obviously exercising. She didn’t notice Black until she approached shore near her robe. She stood up in waist-deep water and exposed that she was skinny dipping… swimming nude. She looked to her robe and saw Black sitting beside it. She frantically plunged down in the water to hide her breasts.

“I wanted to ask you about your first day on the job,” he said. “But y’know, you just showed me something that changed my mind. “I’ll join you.”

Black stripped down to his bare skin and stood unashamed and naked on the beach. He waded slowly into the refreshingly cold water.

“No, wait! What are you doing?” Vivian said, moving into deeper water, taking care to keep only her head above the surface.

“You’re a nice package, y’know, lady.” he said, slowly wading in until the water at last immersed his penis. Vivian wondered at the kind of man who could comfortably expose himself like that. She also wondered of what else he might be capable. He approached her in shoulder-deep water and she turned to escape. With a mighty plunge, Black streaked along underwater and splashed to the surface at Vivian’s back.

Black pinned her arms to her sides, his chest to her back while his hands cupped her breasts. Vivian didn’t call out, because there was no one to respond anyway. There was Jake, but he wasn’t going to interfere with Black, no matter what.

Vivian struggled and wriggled and Black held her easily, even gently, and laughed merrily at her efforts. Suddenly, Viv felt Black’s stiffening penis against her behind. She redoubled her efforts. Black turned her around, hugged her to press her breasts to his chest while his penis poked at her Venus delta.